Use Trigger Animations for Sound and Movie Media Actions in PowerPoint 2007 for Windows

Learn to add trigger animations for sound and movie Actions in PowerPoint 2007 for Windows.

Author:Geetesh Bajaj

Product/Version: PowerPoint 2007 for Windows

OS: Windows XP and higher

Date Created: December 09, 2011Last Updated: December 09, 2011

Slides with interactivity work great in scenarios where the presentation in question is not linear in which slides
advance one after the other at set timings. Also, the person or audience for whom these slides are intended must be
aware that some interactivity has been placed on these slides so that they can go ahead and click on some slide objects
to cause an action to happen. This is especially true for
trigger animations
in which you have to click one object to result in an action happening for another object. Taking the concept of trigger
animations further, you can make a click on a PowerPoint shape (or even an
Action Button) to cause the sound
or video clip on the slide to play, pause, resume, or stop.

We assume that you have already added some actions to play, pause, or stop your media. Depending upon the type of
media you are using, explore the following tutorials to learn how you can add actions to them:

Procedures explained in this tutorial are for a movie clip, but these techniques work the same way for sound clips as well:

Go to the slide that contains a sound or movie clip, and has
Sound Actions or
Video Actions added to the
clip. Now go ahead and insert three shapes which will work as navigation buttons. For our tutorial example,
we inserted three rectangle shapes and typed Play, Pause/Resume, and Stop
respectively within them, as shown in Figure 1. Also note the movie clip on the slide.

Figure 1: Slide with a movie clip and shapes used as navigation buttons

Within the Custom Animation Task Pane, right-click any of the Movie Actions (or Sound Actions).
From the resultant menu, chose the Timing option, as shown in Figure 2.

Figure 2: Timing option for the selected action

This brings up a dialog box with Timing options for the selected Action (Play Movie,
as shown in Figure 3). To add a trigger to cause this Action, click the Triggers
button that you can see highlighted in red in Figure 3.

Figure 3: Triggers button within the Timing tab of the Play Movie dialog box

Within the options that come up, select the Start effect on click of radio button (highlighted in
red in Figure 4). Thereafter, click the down-arrow (highlighted in
blue in Figure 4) to bring up a list containing names of objects on the same slide
(see Figure 4).

Figure 4: List of slide objects displayed for the Start effect on click of option

Within this list, you will find the name of the object through which you want to trigger the selected Action.
In this case, we have chosen the shape with Play written on it.

Tip: The word Play written in this case is merely the text contained within your shape.
Similarly, any text you type in the shape will show up in the Start effect on click of: drop-down list.

Click the OK button to apply the effect and get back to the slide.

Now play your slide in slide show mode, and click the Play button. You will find that this now causes
the movie clip to play.

You can similarly add a Pause action to the next shape (the shape that contains the
Pause / Resume text, shown in Figure 1). When done, play your slide.
You will find that:

Clicking the Play button plays your movie clip.

Clicking the Pause / Resume button pauses your movie clip.

Clicking the Pause / Resume button again resumes your movie clip from the point where you paused it.

Clicking the Stop button does nothing as of now, since you still need to add it as a trigger for the
Stop Action -- we do that next.

Add a Stop action to the final shape (the shape that contains the Stop text, as shown in
Figure 1). When done, play your slide to ascertain that the Stop action now works.

Organic Shapes with Brush Edges

You get 8 shape types plus lines as part of this Organic Shapes collection. Each of these 8 shape types have 10 variants. So you end up with 80
hand-drawn shape options! Again each of these 80 shapes have 12 brush stroke styles! Plus you get the lines and arrows in 12 brush stroke styles too.
Combine all variations to end up with more than 3000 possibilities.